Monday, June 06, 2005

So like every self-respecting gay man in America, I watched the Tony Awards last night. What a great show! And it always leaves me wanting to hop on the next plane to New York and see a bunch of shows. I would love to see Cherry Jones in Doubt -- what a powerful stage presence. And I'd love to see Kathleen Turner and Bill Irwin in Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf. And the Spelling Bee looked quite amusing, and The Light in the Piazza looked charming. And of course Spamalot looks like a hoot. Yup, I could spend a week in New York seeing shows every night and be a happy boy. The awards show itself had some great moments. The very talented and handsome Hugh Jackman doing his "Gotta Dance" number was great. (His duet with Aretha Franklin, on the other hand, was a bit like pairing roast salmon with raspberry sherbet. They're both good, but they don't go well together.) Christina Applegate was a great sport to literally crawl up onto the stage after a "fall" taking a dance turn around a lamppost. Sara Ramirez made her way memorably to the stage, struggling to keep herself from falling out of or over her dress. But after seeing her Lady of the Lake number, I agree she was really good! I find that Tony acceptance speeches are much more professional, genuine, and mostly eloquent compared to the Oscars, and last night was no exception. Billy Crystal thanking his cast was a cute touch, as was Adriane Lenox, who isn't going to wash dishes anymore. And Dan Fogler's little tirade ("I won a Tony. With this hair!"), though the orchestra was needed to cut him off when he got carried away. The low point of the night was the CBS censor, who was heavy-handed with the mute button. Norbert Leo Butz was squelched for a lyric about culture coming out of his ass. And Chita Rivera got totally bleeped out when she accidentally started to eulogize Kander along with Ebb. One of the best parts of the Tony show is that they stage numbers from each of the Best Musical nominees, and all of them were great. (I only wish they would do the same for the non-musical plays. They do these too-quick video montages, half of the time without any sound. What's up with that?) And as my husband noted, there was no shortage of gay marriages on display, including Jerry Mitchell kissing his partner upon hearing he'd won (caught on the TV camera), and Edward Albee speaking of his recently deceased partner of 35 years. But then, that's old news to the theatre crowd. I can remember similar in Tony awards of over a decade ago. You gotta love the theatre!